That was Kalamazoo County Assistant Prosecutor Jeffrey Williams' message to jurors Wednesday just before testimony got underway in Finley's trial in Kalamazoo County Circuit Court.

"Demarcus Finley lifted up his T-shirt, pulled out a .38, walked toward Leonel Lopez until he was a few feet away and shot him one time," Williams said during his opening statement. "The bullet struck Leonel Lopez in the jaw and he was killed."

Finley, 22, is charged with open murder, felon in possession of a firearm, felony use of a firearm and possession with intent to deliver marijuana in connection with the Aug. 23 shooting of Lopez, 43, near the intersection of Stockbridge Avenue and Race Street.

Lopez was the uncle of 13-year-old Michael Day, an eighth grader at Milwood Middle School who was killed on Memorial Day in a shooting near Race and Hays Park Avenue.

Williams contended to the jury Wednesday that the events leading up to Lopez's slaying began when he and Finley happened upon each other at Howard's Party Store on Portage Street and "exchanged words, heated words."

Later, a fistfight would erupt on Stockbridge Avenue, after someone who was with Finley that day threw a beer can at a car occupied by Lopez and some of his family members, Williams said. It was during that fight, Williams said, that a gun was fired and Lopez was killed.

"You'll see that when Demarcus Finley took a gun out of his belt ... and pulled the trigger a few feet from Leonel Lopez's face, he acted deliberately and he acted with vengeance and nothing else."

Jurors heard testimony from six witnesses Wednesday, including two women who said they saw a large fight on Aug. 23 and then witnessed the shooting of Lopez.

"Honestly, I don't think he realized there was a gun being pointed at him," Jessica Merino testified. "The victim fell to the ground and the people just kind of ran away from the scene."

Merino said she witnessed the shooting after coming to a stop behind a Chevrolet Suburban that stopped in the intersection of Race and Stockbridge. She described the man who shot Lopez as a black male who was wearing a white T-shirt and had long, braided hair.

Under questioning from Finley's attorney, James Champion, she estimated that the fight that led up to Lopez's shooting involved about eight people, five of whom were African American and three that were Hispanic and that "the Hispanics were fighting the blacks."

She said she recognized Lopez's niece, Vianka Walton, as one of the people involved I n the fight.

Police had tabbed Finley as a suspect in the shooting the day it occurred, according to testimony Wednesday.

Kalamazoo Public Safety Officer Joe Hutson, who responded to the scene of the Aug. 23 shooting, and later went with Sgt. Anthony Morgan to an apartment in the 500 block of Denway after he was told by Morgan that police had information on a possible suspect.

At the apartment, which was owned by Finley's father, Hutson said he and Morgan found Finley, who was arrested. Later, during a search of a bedroom in the apartment, Hutson said he found a revolver underneath a pile of clothes in a closet.

He said police also found marijuana on Finley, as well as a digital scale a wallet and $391 in cash.

KDPS lab technician Lindsey Denharder later told jurors Wednesday that she later examined the five-shot revolver and found that it contained four live rounds and one spent shell casing.